Policy Series: The Older Americans Act, the Aging Network, and the Pandemic

Abstract This session provides insights into how the pandemic challenged the capabilities and ingenuity of the Older Americans Act (OAA) programs and the aging network and what it means for in-home and community aging services now and in the future. Speakers will include key aging network stakeholders, who will discuss the overnight evolution of programs serving often isolated older adults.


INSPIRE: A NEW EFFORT ON GEROSCIENCE IN TOULOUSE, FRANCE
Bruno Vellas, 1 and Felipe Sierra, 2 , 1. CHU Toulouse: Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Toulouse, Gérontopôle de Toulouse,Institut du Vieillissement,France,2. Toulouse,France The Inspire project of the Toulouse Hospital System is a comprehensive approach to health care in older adults, focused on maintenance of health and physical function. At the core of the project are human, mouse and killifish cohorts, which in the case of humans, is comprised of 1,000 subjects of ages 20 and above, which are followed for a total of 10 years, both via visits to the clinic, and electronic follow-up via the ICOPE app. At recruitment they are stratified as robust, pre-frail or frail according to Fried's criteria, and then followed for loss of Intrinsic Capacities, as defined by WHO. A parallel cohort of Swiss mice with enhanced (exercise) and decreased (high fat diet) health will be used to measure concordant parameters. The project is generating a significant biorepository that is being used to pursue research in several areas where Toulouse has a significant research strength.

THE RISE AND THE DEATH OF SENESCENT CELLS: FROM MECHANISMS TO INTERVENTIONS Marco Demaria, Medical Faculty, Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands
Aging is at the root of age-related diseases and therapies targeting basic age-associated mechanisms have the potential to extend healthy lifespan. A common feature of older organisms is the accumulation of senescent cells -cells that have irreversibly lost the capacity to undergo replication. Senescent cells are characterized by an irreversible cell cycle arrest and by the Senescence-Associated Secretory Phenotype (SASP), which include many tissue remodeling and proinflammatory factors. Senescent cells are intermittently present during embryogenesis and in young organisms. On the contrary senescent cells accumulate and persist in aging tissues. Significantly, these persistent senescent cells can drive low-grade chronic inflammation, and their genetic or pharmacological elimination is sufficient to delay a number of diseases and to improve health span. Here, I will discuss the mechanisms by which senescent cells can promote tissue aging and dysfunction and the potential of targeting senescent cells to delay human aging.

THE GROWING GLOBAL HEALTHY LONGEVITY ECOSYSTEM
Thomas Seoh, Kitalys Institute, Charlottesville, Virginia, United States The geroscience field has started to grow exponentially in recent decades. This in turn has led to a rapidly emerging global ecosystem of players and nodes that has radiated out into fields from clinical investigation to medical practice to capital markets and startup activity to consumer-facing goods and services, regulations, laws and policies and the general wellness-conscious public. These are still early days, and there is uncertainty and a lack of awareness about the shape and activities of this rapidly growing and evolving community. This presentation will attempt a high-level survey of the current landscape in the hope of promoting awareness and collaborations among diverse, multiple initiatives that can accelerate the field.

TRANSLATIONAL GEROSCIENCE: HUMAN MODELS OF HEALTHY AGING AND LONGEVITY Sofiya Milman, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Bronx, New York, United States
While insulin like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) is a wellestablished modulator of aging and longevity in model organisms, its role in humans is less well understood. Previous ambiguities in part have been attributed to cohort characteristics and unawareness of interactions between age and IGF-1. Centenarians have emerged as an ideal model of healthy aging because they delay the onset of age-related diseases and often remain disease free for the duration of their lifespan. In cohorts of centenarians and generally healthy older adults, we demonstrated that reduced IGF-1 is associated with extended lifespan and health-span. Additionally, we confirmed that IGF-1 interacts with age to modify risk in a manner consistent with antagonistic pleiotropy: younger individuals with high IGF-1 are protected from dementia, vascular disease, diabetes, cancer, and osteoporosis, while older individuals do not exhibit IGF-1-associated protection from disease. These findings offer evidence for IGF-1 modulating health-span and lifespan in humans.

THE OLDER AMERICANS ACT, THE AGING NETWORK, AND THE PANDEMIC Chair: Brian Lindberg
This session provides insights into how the pandemic challenged the capabilities and ingenuity of the Older Americans Act (OAA) programs and the aging network and what it means for in-home and community aging services now and in the future. Speakers will include key aging network stakeholders, who will discuss the overnight evolution of programs serving often isolated older adults.